Presentation Type
Oral Presentation
Category
Social Sciences/Humanities
Abstract/Artist Statement
At the culmination of the Second World War, the United States Marines were preparing for a brutal and expensive assault on the Japanese homeland. With the abrupt conclusion of hostilities in September 1945, Marines would be ordered instead to North China in order to accept the surrender of the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces and to repatriate Japanese and Korean nationals back to their respective countries.[1] The Marines would find an amorphous peacekeeping mission in North China, protecting infrastructure and key terrain during the reemergent Chinese Civil War.[2] In Montana, its respected Congressman—Mike Mansfield—and concerned citizens, Marines, and parents viewed the deployment to North China with open skepticism. Codenamed Operation Beleaguer, the U.S. occupation of North China is seemingly a footnote wedged in between World War II and the Korean War. Despite Operation Beleaguer’s relative obscurity, the similar tactical dilemmas—coupled with the strategic complexity of the Cold War—mirrored the American quandaries in Korea and Vietnam. This research project will address how the United States came to avoid a military quagmire—and examine the critical decisions and influences on East Asian U.S. policy in the post-war era from military, congressional, and constituent perspectives.
How did the United States avoid a more serious entanglement into the Chinese Civil War? How did military leaders deescalate tensions in the face of frequent firefights? What role did congressional leaders—like Montana’s Mike Mansfield—play in constraining the occupation? How did citizen resistance influence American leadership? In order to address these key historical questions and to contextualize post-World War II U.S. policy in East Asia, several primary sources will be leveraged. The Mansfield papers on Japan and China at the University of Montana contain several letters from war weary citizens—including the uniformed military—that advocated for rapid redeployment back to the United States while warning of a potential disaster in China. The Mansfield papers and Montana newspapers will serve as a local lens into popular opinion about the U.S. occupation of North China and early Cold War U.S. Far East defense policy. The National Archives’ State Department records on Japan and the Chinese Civil War will serve to illuminate U.S. grand strategy in the Far East, arguments for and against direct intervention, and General George Marshall’s diplomatic attempt to broker a peace deal in China. The operational military perspective will largely be gained via the unit command chronologies available from the U.S. Marine Corps archives at Quantico, Virginia. Finally, the policy-shaping and oversight of the U.S. Congress will be accessed through the digitized Congressional Record. While the United States would argue throughout the Cold War about who “lost China,” American forces were perilously close to direct intervention in the Chinese Civil War. How and why this pitfall was avoided is the anchor of this research.
[1] Parkyn, Michael. "Operation BELEAGUER: The Marine III Amphibious Corps in North China, 1945-49." Marine Corps Gazette 85, no. 7 (07, 2001): 32-37.
[2] Henry I. Shaw, The United States Marines in North China 1945-1949. (Quantico: U.S. Marine Corps Historical Branch, 1960). 1, 25-26.
Mentor Name
Anya Jabour
Personal Statement
As a retired Marine Lieutenant Colonel, Montana native, and University of Montana graduate student, this largely unexplored historical topic resonates with me both on an intellectual and a personal level. As a Marine officer, I experienced the difficulties of translating amorphous and often conflicting national policies into complex nation-building and counter-insurgency operations. Rooting out the historical actors and revealing their agency will be a key goal of this research project. Marines pride themselves on knowing their history—but the occupation of North China is rarely noted or referenced in Marine lore. Perusing the Mansfield papers, I became aware of Operation Beleaguer for the first time—and noted the surprisingly frank constituent correspondence in opposition to the occupation. All the familiar elements of a U.S. quagmire were present in North China: a large foreign occupation, unclear objectives, an open-ended timeline, questionable partners, and long-standing sectarian grudges. How North China didn’t become a U.S. military tragedy like Vietnam is a topic worthy of historical exploration. Mike Mansfield’s influential role in avoiding intervention into the Chinese Civil War elevates this historical research’s value to the University of Montana and all Montanans writ large.
Montana Voices: Military, Congressional, and Popular Resistance to American Intervention in the Chinese Civil War from 1945-1949
At the culmination of the Second World War, the United States Marines were preparing for a brutal and expensive assault on the Japanese homeland. With the abrupt conclusion of hostilities in September 1945, Marines would be ordered instead to North China in order to accept the surrender of the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces and to repatriate Japanese and Korean nationals back to their respective countries.[1] The Marines would find an amorphous peacekeeping mission in North China, protecting infrastructure and key terrain during the reemergent Chinese Civil War.[2] In Montana, its respected Congressman—Mike Mansfield—and concerned citizens, Marines, and parents viewed the deployment to North China with open skepticism. Codenamed Operation Beleaguer, the U.S. occupation of North China is seemingly a footnote wedged in between World War II and the Korean War. Despite Operation Beleaguer’s relative obscurity, the similar tactical dilemmas—coupled with the strategic complexity of the Cold War—mirrored the American quandaries in Korea and Vietnam. This research project will address how the United States came to avoid a military quagmire—and examine the critical decisions and influences on East Asian U.S. policy in the post-war era from military, congressional, and constituent perspectives.
How did the United States avoid a more serious entanglement into the Chinese Civil War? How did military leaders deescalate tensions in the face of frequent firefights? What role did congressional leaders—like Montana’s Mike Mansfield—play in constraining the occupation? How did citizen resistance influence American leadership? In order to address these key historical questions and to contextualize post-World War II U.S. policy in East Asia, several primary sources will be leveraged. The Mansfield papers on Japan and China at the University of Montana contain several letters from war weary citizens—including the uniformed military—that advocated for rapid redeployment back to the United States while warning of a potential disaster in China. The Mansfield papers and Montana newspapers will serve as a local lens into popular opinion about the U.S. occupation of North China and early Cold War U.S. Far East defense policy. The National Archives’ State Department records on Japan and the Chinese Civil War will serve to illuminate U.S. grand strategy in the Far East, arguments for and against direct intervention, and General George Marshall’s diplomatic attempt to broker a peace deal in China. The operational military perspective will largely be gained via the unit command chronologies available from the U.S. Marine Corps archives at Quantico, Virginia. Finally, the policy-shaping and oversight of the U.S. Congress will be accessed through the digitized Congressional Record. While the United States would argue throughout the Cold War about who “lost China,” American forces were perilously close to direct intervention in the Chinese Civil War. How and why this pitfall was avoided is the anchor of this research.
[1] Parkyn, Michael. "Operation BELEAGUER: The Marine III Amphibious Corps in North China, 1945-49." Marine Corps Gazette 85, no. 7 (07, 2001): 32-37.
[2] Henry I. Shaw, The United States Marines in North China 1945-1949. (Quantico: U.S. Marine Corps Historical Branch, 1960). 1, 25-26.